We here at Spectral Review are not paranormal investigators, demonologists, or drama critics. We don’t even play any of those on TV! But we do watch most paranormal shows and can tell the good ones from the bad.

Ghost Hunters International episode report card.

“Headless Haunting”

The team visits a German fortress whose chambers are haunted by the spirit of a beheaded 13th century nobleman. Then it’s off to Slovakia where the team separates legends from facts in the dark halls of Orava Castle.

Ghost Hunters International visits two locations. A castle in Germany and one in Slovakia.

Case: Orava Castle

The Orava Castle is just one of many castles in Slovakia built in the 13th century. It was built and added onto over the centuries.

Client Credibility
The team was shown around the castle by Peter Palka who is a local historian. He says he believes in a “higher power” so we interpret that to mean he has an open mind about the paranormal. He shows the team the newest part of the castle that was built by the Thurzo family. Juraj Thurzo’s wife Elizabeth is known as the “Black Lady” as her spirit has been seen wearing black clothes.

Peter leads the team on the upper level which is an older part of the castle. This part of the castle was built during time of war with the Turks and wars between Protestants and Catholics. He tells of a story where the Archbishop was bricked into a wall during the 15th century.

Next they go to the citadel part of the castle, the oldest part of the castle. The story there is about the “White Lady”. The owner of the castle at the time was known as a rough and angry guy. At one point he cut his wife’s arm off and she died two days later. The story continues years later when he was in his death bed dying she appeared before him in white wedding clothes and she told him she forgives him. What a good sport!

Peter doesn’t at this point tell us the name of the man and this “White Lady”.

Peter seemed very credible.

Investigation

Robb and Andy begin in the “torture” room with the thermal camera. They heard a door noise and followed where it lead but did not find anything.

Brian and Barry go to the citadel part of the castle to try to catch the lady in white. They try to capture some EVPs. Barry feels being touched and both of them see some shadows.

Robb and Andy decide to do a thermal sweep of the citadel. They also try to capture some EVPs. They seem to find something with the thermal but it proves to be nothing.

Shannon Sylvia and Brian go to the “museum”. Brian tries to teach Shannon some “tricks of the trade”. Brian feels he is touched. They both report seeing shadows. Why don’t they try to get something on video?

Then Barry and Donna LaCroix go to the museum and also feel they are touched. Donna feels like a hand was shoved into her face. All scary reports but nothing on video.

Barry and Andy return to the citadel. They try to setup the EMF to be an “alert” like they did in an earlier episode at the Black Horse Inn. It does spike and they try to get EVPs.

Evidence

They did catch one EVP to Donna’s comment complementing Barry which was “I know”. It was a pretty clear EVP but we wonder why it’s in English. A second EVP to Donna’s question “Is there somebody here now?” It’s clearly a male voice but the team cannot figure it out. They leave it to Peter to determine that it sounds like “Donzhon”. Which turns out that is the name of the man who cut off the white ladies arm and was forgiven. Now this would have been impressive if Peter had told us the name at the beginning of the show. It’s still impressive to us because Peter seems credible.

One last EVP that seems to be “nyet”, or no in Russian to a Robb question whether “they wanted them there”.

Case: Reichenstein Castle

Client Credibility

The Reichenstein Castle was shown to the team by Sandor Schmitz who is the caretaker. He told the team that the castle was origianl a toll castle, a castle that collects tolls as ships pass it on the river. These tolls were excessive and the owners were known as robber barons. One owner by the name of Dietrich von Hohenfels would behead the owners of the ship if they wouldn’t pay the toll.

He tells the team of reports of shadows and noises in a couple of rooms of the castle. In another room the headless ghost of Dietrich von Hohenfels has been seen. Sandor believes the headless ghost does haunt the castle. He seems credible.

Investigation

Andy and Robb do a thermal sweep. They don’t find anything out of the ordinary. Robb tells that a legend is that the headless ghost can be seen from a tower. Andy says he will climb it, he does and states he doesn’t see the ghost. Robb tells “monkey boy” to come down.

Andy and Brian again use the EMF detectors as “alarms”. They go off a few times. Andy felt he was touched.

Shannon and Donna managed to work Olga’s room to try to get some EVPs. We know their styles clash a bit but the last few episodes Donna has gotten the best EVPs. They felt they were smelling some sort of scent. Or as Shannon said she “smelt” something.

Evidence

They were not able to get any EVPs or anything on the video. Just several personal experiences which as Robb says isn’t really evidence.

Conclusion

Still overall another good episode from the Ghost Hunters International series. They have one more episode left in this first season. Maybe they can get something on video since they really haven’t gotten anything on video in any of the episodes. Another nice thing for this episode is that they did not show any “drama” interactions with the people on the show. It’s something we can just do without.

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